First Step Trust Annual General Meeting January 2007
Sainsbury Centre Chief Executive guest of honour at FST’s Annual General Meeting January 2007
This year, we decided to do something special with our Annual General Meeting. So we invited Angela Greatley, Chief Executive of theSainsbury Centre for Mental Health to be our guest speaker, and arranged an evening event, with all members of FST invited.
AGM Photo Gallery
It was a huge success, with over 200 members of FST attending not only from the London projects- Greenwich, Bexley, Lambeth, Enfield, Barnet and Haringey, but even from farther afield, - Salford, Sheffield, Birmingham, Broadmoor and Liverpool.
We were also pleased to see specially invited guests local Councillor, David Grant, and representatives of Oxleas NHS Trust, Linda Pearce and Patsy Fung.
The AGM began with an overview of the year by the Chair, Dr Paul Lelliott. He said it had been a difficult year, but one in which FST had continued to achieve.
Despite funding pressures in some areas, FST had succeeded in providing a wide range of work opportunities throughout its projects with overall numbers of people participating in the projects continuing to grow. A major achievement had been the big increase in the number of people progressing on from FST to open employment, with this year’s figure doubling that of last year. FST SMaRT, our important new development in the North West had made significant progress and now looked well placed to acquire its second premises. Strong links had been made with local agencies, including the successful acquisition of training contracts with the Learning & Skills Council & Jobcentre Plus.
Paul thanked everyone for their hard work, energy and dedication in contributing to these achievements throughout the year.
The formal business of the AGM concluded, Angela Greatley took the stage. She spoke about the values and priorities of the Sainsbury Centre, with its commitment to people with mental health problems in prison and in secure psychiatric services. It was encouraging to hear her echoing many of the themes important to FST, especially the need to provide services that improve the quality of life for those who may be years before they are ready to consider moving on to employment. She reminded us that although social inclusion is an important agenda for us all, this must not be at the cost of services to those for whom paid employment is a distant prospect.
Angela’s speech was well received. She then went on to hand out the FST Positive Action Awards, with assistance from John Story, an FST Director. The awards are given to FST workforce and salaried staff for exceptional performance, nominated by their colleagues and chosen by a panel of FST directors and workforce members.
There were 20 nominations across all the categories, all of a high quality. Congratulations to the winners listed below:
Worker of the year - Ashrafi, FST Abbevilles R , FST@Ardenleigh
Manager of the year - Warren, FST Bexley
Special commendation - Jeff, FST Enfield
Project of the year - FST Enfield
Customer care - Pamela, The Laurels
Special achievements - Duane, FST Enfield
There was one surprise award too, to express FST’s gratitude to Dick Deacon, whose support over the years at Broadmoor Hospital had been invaluable in enabling the FST project to develop.
The evening was rounded off by an excellent hot buffet by FST Abbevilles, including a truly superb Thai Chicken.
Many thanks to all who helped organise such an enjoyable evening and to Forum@Christchurch for the excellent venue.
Feb 2007
Extra words for finding
Home : Projects : About Us : News & Jobs : Contact Us : Internal Documents : : Site Map :